Sherline Lathe Conversion ?

andypugh wrote: For your next trick, convert the Goodway to CNC

I have thought about it. What's stopped me is the cost of ball screws/etc, not having a lathe during the retrofit, the concept of cramming a ball screw into the cross slide, and not knowing if a cnc lathe is worthwhile for one off hobby use. The Sherline is a test to see if one is worthwhile. If worthwhile, and the Sherline is too small, I'll likely start again with an 8" class lathe. Ha, you asked so there.

andypugh wrote:

currinh wrote: I loaded LinuxCNC in simulation mode trying to track down some CamBam/G-Code questions. It seemed that LinuxCNC was rounding corners during rapid moves

It does that. The degree to which it does it is partly governed by the acceleration settings of the machine, and perhaps those are low in the simulator config you were looking at. I think that the G64 (etc) settings can also have a bearing on this, even in rapid moves.

OK, not a problem then. I guess rounding corners on rapids shouldn't hurt anything. It was a surprise when I noticed it though.

Thanks.

Hugh

currinh wrote: What's stopped me is the cost of ball screws/etc, not having a lathe during the retrofit, the concept of cramming a ball screw into the cross slide, and not knowing if a cnc lathe is worthwhile for one off hobby use.

I think it is. So much so that I am part-way through my second conversion.
The first was a Chinese 9x20 lathe done on-the-cheap with steppers.
This time I am doing it "right" and have spent more on castings alone than the entire Chinese conversion cost.
I am blogging the process: bodgesoc.blogspot.co.uk/2015/08/holbrook1.html

Haven't been keeping up with the forum lately - but find attached some pics of my sherline lathe spindle encoder.
I used the original sherline tacho encoder for the index pulse, and created my own 60 slotted disk for the RPM, and the optical interupter is a honeywell HOA2001. Might not be available anymore, had it lying around from 1984
Spindle speed controller is a DigiSpeed-SL™ DC-04 from Homann Designs.
Stepper controller is standard sherline, and all of the extra electronics are squeezed into that.





Works well, cuts threads within the limitations of the sherline anyway. If you ever have your chance again - get the long bed one next time!

Zipped up some drawings if of any use to someone else - your chinese encoder is probably far superior. But will be fun to mount!

Enjoy.

verticalperformance:

I've been on the road for the last two months so couldn't reply till now. Thanks for the info. The drawings won't help much if I go with the encoder, but will likely help others. I like your solution, it looks very clean and functional.

The info on the Holman speed controller may be useful. I think the Gecko G540 may have outputs that can be wired directly into the Sherline motor controller. I haven't tried it so I'm not yet sure. If that doesn't work I'll be looking for a solution like the Holman.

No recent progress due to travels. I hope to get back to mounting the encoder soon, but have a couple of short trips coming up and more project than I can remember.

Thanks.

Hugh

I have 2 Sherline machines sitting in the closet... One day I will get to making a controller for them.


www.stevenrhine.com/wp-content/uploads/2...e-Mill--1024x576.jpg

Contract_Pilot wrote: I have 2 Sherline machines sitting in the closet... One day I will get to making a controller for them.

Looks like both of those have been previously set up for CNC. Does the lathe have an encoder mounted? Since the hardware is there it shouldn't take too much to get them working. The Gecko I used above works well. You could share a controller between the two.

I'm just trying to find the time to complete the conversion I've started. Some 6 months since I've had time to work on it. Way too much work on our travel trailer and a basement retaining wall. I want to get back to things I can easily lift (Sherline, model engines, etc). Once I get the encoder mounted I'll start trying to figure out a set-up for LinuxCNC. That's where I'll need help if I can just get to that point.

Thanks for the note.

Hugh